


All Things Rare and Precious

by defragmentise (croixsouillees), spirithorse



Series: Kingmaker [3]
Category: Tales of Zestiria
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-21
Updated: 2017-03-21
Packaged: 2018-10-08 20:02:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,741
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10394970
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/croixsouillees/pseuds/defragmentise, https://archiveofourown.org/users/spirithorse/pseuds/spirithorse
Summary: In the face of escalation in the civil war that's consuming the Rolance Empire, Eizen and Edna try to escape from their home and flee to the one last refuge left for seraphim.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I got hit by some serious Eizen feels while watching Tales of Berseria, this was not helped by Nami’s encouragement. Takes place before _All Glory Ends in Night_.

“I saw the soul  
torn from its body,  
so he said, by hate  
and envy –  
not for any wrong he did”  
\- _Purgatory_ , Dante

* * *

 

Eizen walked through their cave, checking to see if he and Edna had missed anything. As seraphim, it wasn’t their habit to keep too many things and, as a sailor, Eizen had often stuck with only the things that he could carry easily. He just wanted to make sure that they had the essentials and anything that could be used as a vessel.

He rubbed his thumb around the edge of his coin, glancing around the empty cave. The two of them had been safe on Rayfalke because no one had bothered to come near the mountain. It wasn’t in a strategic position and there were plenty of rumors about a dragon lurking at the top.

Eizen snorted, shaking his head. Humans were always willing to believe fantastic tales rather than seeking out the truth. If there was a mountain, then humans would believe that there was a dragon lurking there. But he wasn’t about to complain, not when it had kept both him and Edna safe for so long. It had allowed them the time to plan while all the other seraphim had panicked and run. Eizen had almost expected them to flock to Rayfalke or deeper in Hyland where there were rumors of another group of seraphim, but he couldn’t blame them for wanting to get further away.

The empire was extending its reach again. It had been ten years since it had rolled over Hyland and subjugated the country. Eizen had watched the advance warily, ready for the forces that were conquering Hyland to turn towards them. After all, everyone had heard about what had happened to Maotelus when Camlann had burned. Now, it sounded like the two sons of the emperor were determined to fight each other, and for that they would need seraphim. Eizen had watched one army march past, tracking them through the earth until they were out of range of his senses, but their direction was clear. They were heading for the other seraphim. If the empire was going for them, then it was only a matter of time before they started listening to all the rumors. Eizen did not intend to become a weapon for them.

He gave a stack of rocks a cursory look before turning on his heel. There was nothing left worth taking, and they couldn’t delay while they had their opening. It was slightly underhand to leave while the other seraphim were being attacked, but Eizen couldn’t think of a better distraction. Maybe when they got to temporary safety he would think about their options, but the more important thing was getting away from the empire and their weapons.

Eizen walked out of the cave, glancing down the twisting trail for any signs of red or black that meant the empire had found them. To his relief, the path was clear save for a group of humans standing partially down the path. One of them waved to him, the others were distracted, tapping their fingers nervously on their weapons. Eizen nodded at them and stepped down the trail.

Benwick was quick to fall in with him, the blond man tugging at his hat like he wanted to remove it, but at least he remembered the loose rule that Eizen had given them. He might not have been the first mate of the _Van Eltia_ , and he hadn’t been for years, but all of these men had heard of all the stories that their fathers and grandfathers had told them about the pirate ship _Van Eltia_ , her captain Van Aifread and his first mate, the seraph with the Reaper’s Curse. Eizen was sure that the stories had been conflated over the years considering his reputation. Every one of the men here were descendants of those who had survived the curse, and they took pride in that. Eizen was fine with their pride, it was a great and noble legacy that they were following up on.  He would draw the line at being treated like some great seraph who should be worshipped. That might have been fine for other seraphim, but Eizen had always preferred the company of humans to the distance that being a thing of worship came with.

Benwick fiddled with his hat a moment longer before seeming to come to a compromise. He took off his hat and swiped his forehead with it before holding it loosely in his hand. He cleared his through, Eizen watching him start to form the ‘proper’ phrasing to talk to a seraph before he shook his head. “It looks like we’re clear. Stanley said he saw what looked like a group of scouts moving close, but they were heading towards Marlind.”

“We shouldn’t chance it.”

“No, sir.” Benwick sighed and set the hat back on his head. “You can never tell with the empire these days. At least Heldalf was steady. This Leon fellows seemed to be more interested in fighting with his brothers than ruling the empire.”

“And raising taxes.”

One of the men piped up from the side, Benwick nodding towards him. “And raising taxes. Can’t get a ship in and out of a port without paying a ridiculous fine. All money for the wars.”

Eizen huffed, crossing his arms over his chest. That would present a problem if they needed to get away, but he couldn’t think of a place that could be reached and be away from the empire. It looked like they would be running, unless they managed to get to the mythical place that the wind seraphim had found, but Eizen wasn’t optimistic enough to believe that was a place. If anything, all the wind seraphim were being held by the empire and the rest of them would be next if they weren’t careful.

He glanced around at the humans before shaking his head. They were wasting their precious time.

Eizen turned around, spotting Edna where she was tucked against the mountain. She gave him a steady glare, Eizen taking that to mean that she wasn’t too pleased about the plan. Then again, the mountain had been her home for all of her life. Edna didn’t have the same wanderlust that Eizen did, she was more than happy to stay in one place for long spans of time.

He sighed and walked over to her, dropping in a crouch in front of her. “You have everything?”

Edna gave him a curt nod, adjusting her hold on her umbrella. She clutched it close to her chest. “I do. But where are we going?”

“Where we’ll be safe.”

Edna shot him a look that said she didn’t entirely believe him, but it was better than an argument. He shook his head, reaching into his pocket to pull out a small stuffed animal. He held it up, letting it dangle between the two of them. “One more thing. For you.”

Edna lifted one hand from her umbrella, taking the little plush by the string she stared at it for a moment, Eizen noting the way her eyes widened when she felt the pulse of energy from it. Edna was quick to wrap both of her hands around it, restraining the plush like it would be enough to keep it in place. When she looked back at him, her eyes were wide.

Eizen gently took the stuffed animal from her, tying it to her umbrella. “I meant to give this to you before, but plans changed. But it will keep you safe.”

Edna turned her head, staring at the small toy before reaching up to flick it. “Will it work?”

“We’ll just have to see.” Eizen stood up, listening to her get to her feet as he glanced back over at the humans. “Benwick.”

Benwick nodded and motioned to the rest of them. “Come on. Let’s get out of here before someone notices. The empire is looking with wide eyes today.”

There were a couple of chuckles and some muted cheers before they started off down the mountain. Eizen let them go, sticking back with Edna.

She walked along without a complaint, the only sign of how she felt the steady tapping of the umbrella against her shoulder. Eizen watched the motion out of the corner of his eye, his gaze following the toy that bobbed up and down with the force of the motion. He saw her fingers tighten around the handle before Edna let the umbrella rest easily on her shoulder.

“Where are we going?”

“Down to a Hyland dock and out from there.”

“But where?”

“We’ll have to see.”

Edna huffed at his answer, but he didn’t blame her. He didn’t have a more concrete plan, not since away seemed to be their only option. He’d figure out what they had to do once they were out on the ocean. Although, the fact that there wasn’t a definite place made him want to give up the search altogether. Being out on the ocean wasn’t too bad, it had worked for him before. And, if port taxes were going up, there would always be people willing to avoid them. Maybe it was time to come out of retirement.

Eizen sighed and looked out over the mountain, trying to sense something in the familiar crags and caves. Rayfalke was usually very quiet save for some of the animals that would scurry around on it. Edna’s blessing was usually enough to keep things quiet on the hellion front, but that was a problem they would have to tackle once they reached the base of the mountain. Eizen rolled his shoulders, unable to stop himself from smiling. It had been a while since he had gotten into a good fight. He would have been able to satisfy the urge with his wandering, but he had stopped that when it looked like the empire was getting too dangerous to leave Edna behind on her own. It didn’t matter how capable she was, the empire had numbers and seraphim could still die.

He was startled out of his thoughts as Benwick dropped back to walk beside him. The man was still fidgeting with his hat and his gaze was darting nervously around the mountain path. “Thank you for doing this.”

“Why? You’re the ones doing us a favor.”

“This? Consider this recognition for our fathers and grandfathers.” Benwick waved his hand in dismissal, his face going serious a moment later. “They would have skinned us all alive if we had let anything happen to you. That and you’re the one who best knows how to get Van Eltia Shipping back on her feet in a time like this.”

“It would be a shame if the name died out.”

Benwick nodded. “A real shame, especially after all the effort you put into it.”

Eizen huffed, not bothering to respond. He was sure that the sailors and their families had put more effort into the shipping company, if only because they’d had to avoid his bad luck. But he wasn’t about to disabuse the humans of their beliefs, not when it wasn’t hurting anyone. He looked over the assembled group of humans, feeling the corner of his mouth twitch up in a smile. They were more than he ever considered would come and help him, it had been hundreds of years after all.

He looked towards the front of the group, about to ask about the ship that they had waiting when he saw someone come running towards them. Eizen squinted, feeling Edna shrink back against his side. He draped an arm over her shoulder, pulling her close as the group rushed up to hear what the person was saying.

They couldn’t get much out of the way that the person was panting for breath, but the frantic motions over their shoulder was enough to draw his attention away from them.

He scanned the bottom of the mountain, almost ready to say that they give them enough air to breathe so they could get a word out. Then he saw the red banners coming around a bend in the path. He felt his breath catch in his throat, Eizen staring at the winged diamonds and crown of the empire. “They found us.”

The humans cursed and started to rush into position, but Eizen ignored them. They wouldn’t be enough to match up against whatever the empire was sending. Not even his or Edna’s presence would help considering that all of the soldiers were bound to have weapons with seraphim bound inside them. The odds were overwhelming.

He pried Edna away from his side, nudging her towards one of the humans even as he reached out to grab Benwick’s shoulder. The pressure was enough to turn the man towards him. Eizen gave him a serious nod before stepping in front of him. “There’s another way down the mountain. Edna can show you the way. It’s a little out of our way, but better than dealing with the empire.”

“And you?”

“I’ll keep them busy for a bit.” Eizen ground one boot into the dirt, feeling along the fissures of the rock as he talked. With the path so narrow it would be simple enough to block them in, but to make it efficient he’d have to wait for the army to make their way a bit further up the path. If it couldn’t leave Rayfalke, then it couldn’t go out trying to capture other seraphim. He nodded to himself, glancing back over at where Edna was peering out from under the arm of one of the humans. “I’ll be fine.”

The look that Edna gave him said she didn’t entirely believe him, but at least she didn’t argue. Usually Eizen would have worried, because Edna was not one to let her opinions sit quietly, but he would let it go under these conditions. He had lectured her enough about what would happen if the empire came after them, and she had seen how the seraphim had slowly disappeared with the spread of malevolence. It was enough to make her listen right away, which was something that he was grateful for.

He turned his head to watch as the group ran off, not taking his attention away from the approaching army for too long. From the shouts and the gesturing that he could see, the army had spotted them. They broke into a run, Eizen watching as the men poured in. His frown deepened the more soldiers rushed onto the path.

He had expected a small group. Certainly more effort would be put into a bigger prize, unless they were reaching for any seraphim they could. If that was the case, then they were truly desperate. And dangerous.

Eizen shifted his stance, waiting until the last of the army had poured onto the trail before reaching out. It was easy enough to tip rocks onto their path, Eizen watching as the humans panicked. He thought he heard someone scream something about a seraph before he was reaching behind him to bring up another wall of stone. It rumbled up, Eizen coaxing it to rise to the rock overhang even as he backed away towards the path that Edna and the others had taken.

The stone walls wouldn’t hold the army forever, Eizen was sure that they would start to dig themselves out with their seraphic weapons or the rest of the army would come along to help them, but it would give them the time to get away. Any amount of time that they could win for themselves was useful.

He stepped back onto the path, ready to raise another stone wall when he felt the earth tremble. He recognized the arte that went into it, Eizen turning to look as towers of stone rose from the earth. None of them stayed long, the rough pillars shooting up before crashing back down in fragments. It wasn’t a defensive strategy, it was an attack.

Eizen cursed under his breath, throwing his walls of stone up with more force than necessary. Rocks tumbled down around him as the wall knocked into some of the overhangs from the mountain. Eizen shoved them away from him, not caring where they deflected to. The army at the base of the mountain was penned in, which was all that mattered for the moment. The biggest threat was whatever was making Edna have to fight. For a moment, he considered the idea that Benwick and the others from the Van Eltia Shipping Company had betrayed him, but he pushed the thought away. None of them ever would, not even if the empire threatened them. It was a matter of honor. There must have been another troop of soldiers instead, something that Eizen hadn’t considered or planned for.

Of course the empire wouldn’t just send one group of soldiers to capture seraphim, they were used to the operation. He’d been so focused on the problem in front of him that he hadn’t considered the option. Or it was just his reaper’s curse interfering. Eizen had just hoped that it would stick close to him and spare the others.

The earth shook under his feet, Eizen stumbling as he heard a scream from down the path.

“Edna!”

The mountain caught the echoes of his shout and flung them back at him, but Edna didn’t respond. The sound of his own voice bouncing back to him was enough to send him into a panic, Eizen pushing himself faster.

A cascade of rocks had fallen across the path, Eizen sure that it had come from Edna trying to block the way. It was a smart move, but it was more of an annoyance because he had to take his time to reach out and shove the rocks aside.

He moved them with force, not caring that the rocks were thrown into the air to scatter onto the ground behind him or further up the mountain. He didn’t bother to check where they landed, just as long as they were out of his way. They could land back on the empire’s army for all he cared, they deserved it.

Eizen partially slid down a steep slope, having to jump awkwardly to the side to avoid a corpse that was sprawled across the middle of the path. He glanced down long enough to make sure that it wasn’t Edna before continuing down the slope, finally tumbling off an overhang with a short drop to the ground.

He dropped to his knees as he landed, Eizen pressing one hand against the ground to try and balance himself and to feel something solid under his hand. He spread his fingers out, feeling the earth rumble at is responded to him, a low grumble of a warning as he glanced around.

The path widened out at this point, a bad place to try and defend. But it looks like none of them had gotten a choice. From the almost neat pile of human corpses by the overhang, it looked like they had been shot off. The few that had jumped down to try and fight hadn’t succeeded either. The three soldiers of the empire that were lying dead showed that they had done their best, but a sizable force must have been waiting for them.

Eizen scanned over the corpses and the scars in the earth from where Edna had forced it up in defense. He didn’t know how the empire had known about the back trail, or if they had been scouting out the mountain for days to make sure that everything went right, and he didn’t care. There were people dead because he had called them to help and his sister was missing.

He frowned and got up slowly, glancing around for any sign of the rest of the soldiers. There wouldn’t have only been three, the empire wasn’t stupid enough for that. If there had been more, they had run off either because they had been chased away or because they were chasing Edna.

Eizen muttered a curse under his breath, pushing off from the ground. He strode forward, about to break into a run when he heard something snap under his boot. He twisted to the side, his eyes widening as he saw the pendant on the ground. He crouched to pick it up, handling the edge where the casing for the white stone had broken.

It was Edna’s, he remembered finding it and making it for her before he had gone on one of his expeditions. She never took the thing off, not even to change out the stone like he had suggested a few times. But the ribbon that had secured it was broken and fraying, like it had been pulled off of her neck.

Eizen stared at the pendant, his hands shaking violently. There had been soldiers, and they had taken Edna.

The rattle of stone caught his attention, Eizen turning with a growl. The group he had been detaining had gotten out of his trap faster than he expected. Eizen narrowed his eyes as the snap of yellow light that he saw from one soldier’s mace.

He narrowed his eyes, watching as they rushed down the hill towards him. It didn’t take much more for him to make his decision.

The humans were dead, as probably was Zaveid. He had hoped that he could find him and the three of them could manage to survive on their own, but hadn’t seen hide or hair of the wind seraph for years, but even that made a horrible kind of sense. The wind seraphim had probably been the first to go. And now the empire had taken Edna away from him too.

He snarled, tucking the pendant into his pocket with care. Those were all of his reasons to run out of the way, which meant that he had no other choice but to stand and fight, and he had no reason to stop, not even if he crossed the line from seraph to hellion. He wasn’t going to see any of them again. No one cared enough about the seraphim to use them for anything more than tools. If he was lucky, he’d be make the soldiers call for reinforcements, and he could take care of the one who had taken Edna. Dead was far better than being used and suffering for it for the rest of eternity.

He lifted his hands, throwing a grin at the soldiers as they came down the drop. “Come on then.”

The soldiers hesitated for a moment before charging forward, Eizen rushing forward to meet them with his own fists.

It was wonderfully cathartic to sink his fist into the stomach of one of the soldiers, pulling from the steadiness of the earth to send the man flying backward.

The soldier crashed into the others, but Eizen was already turning to face the next ones. These at least had the sense to take their time.

Eizen charged forward with a shout, the sound of it echoing off the mountain almost enough to drown out the hurried chant in ancient tongue. He felt the words tug at him, but he ignored them in favor of pushing forward. If they wanted him, they would have to _work_ for it.

He screamed as he plowed into the midst of them, laying about him with his fists and the stones of the mountain until the words dug in and _tugged_.

And then he was left with nothing but cold steel and pain.

* * *

Edna pressed her hand against the rocks that she had rolled together, closing her eyes as she concentrated. From what she could tell, the soldiers had marched past without suspecting a thing, which meant that she could climb out. Edna frowned, extending her reach over the path. It didn’t go as far as it had the day before, or even the weeks before, but it was still enough to check on who was coming. The road hadn’t looked like it was a well-travelled one, which was why she had taken it. It might have taken longer to get to the coast, but it was safer. Longer meant fewer humans and less of a chance to get captured by them.

She had already had to dodge a great host, one that she had watched pass by while crouching underneath a bridge. She hadn’t seen much of them, but the seraphim she had been able to sense had told her enough. It had seemed like there were so many more seraphim than there were humans, and that was frightening.

Eizen had always said that there weren’t many seraphim left in the world, and she had believed it. It had been years since Zaveid had come to the mountain to bother them, or any other seraph that Eizen had met through his travels. The malevolence choking the world just made it worse.

She smothered a cough into her arm, squeezing her eyes shut as she felt the malevolence settle dark and thick at the back of her throat. Edna made a face, lifting her face away from her arm to spit to one side.

Malevolence tasted bad, but there was nothing she could do about it. It hung thick in the air and Edna was sure that it was getting thicker by the day. She glanced down at her fingers, flexing them slowly. She could still stand against it, even if it made her sick, but there would be a time where she couldn’t. By then, she had to be down by the meeting place that Eizen had arranged. Edna doubted that any of the humans had made it, but there was always a slim chance. If not, then she was sure that one of the ships would take her, even if it was because she knew Eizen. Setting sail on the sea made her feel a little queasy, because it would be miles of ocean with any earth so muffled that it would be like it wasn’t there. But she didn’t have any other option.

If Eizen was still alive he would have found her by now, and it had been weeks.

Edna felt something different clog the back of her throat, quickly swallowing back her tears. Crying could come later when she was on the move, because she couldn’t stay here for much longer.

She moved the rock out of the way, pushing it back until it was flush against the base of the tree that she had pulled it from. Edna eyes the rushed patchwork she had done on the spot where she had pulled the rock out from the earth. Still, it hadn’t been enough to call the attention of the soldiers, so she considered it a win.

Edna nudged the rock into a better position before shaking her umbrella out. She opened and closed it a few times to check to see if it still worked. Edna sighed when it did, reaching up to play with the stuffed toy that was tied to it. She smiled when she felt the pulse of power from the thing, a reminder that it was still alive. She didn’t quite know what it was for, but the fact that Eizen had given it to her was good enough. It would work as a little extra bit of insurance, a little something in case things got worse. And that was a distinct possibility.

She gave the stuffed toy one more squeeze before setting off down the road, walking quickly. She had the advantage of humans that she could walk through the night, but that came with its own dangers. Hellions were always on the prowl, but they seemed to come out in force at night, and she was just a walking snack. She could only go so long before taking a rest, and that would lose her time, or worse.

She tapped her shoulder with her umbrella twice, using the steady thud of it against her as a way to ground herself. There wasn’t time for deep thoughts, her attention had to be on the road.

Edna closed her eyes for the space of a breath, adjusting herself to the feeling of the earth again. She opened her eyes when she felt it come back to her. She’d been doing it since she realized that no one was coming to find her immediately. It was one of the ways she had kept herself safe since she couldn’t see everything that there was around her. The earth could tell her enough about things in the distance that she’d have the time to defend herself or hide away. It had been more of the latter than the former, but Edna didn’t intend on being caught or eaten.

She scanned the edge of the forest warily. It would take her longer to skirt around it, but the forest looked thick and she didn’t want to get stuck in there, certainly not when she could feel a deep malevolence there. She would be cautious and move as fast as she could.

Edna settled herself into the comfortable blankness that came from the long march of the day, paying more attention to her surrounding and the information that she got from the ground.

There was always some kind of rumbling or movement, but it was just a matter of picking out the ones that were heading her way, and then the ones that would meet her directly. Those were easy enough to sort through, because she was looking for large groups of people. People traveling on their own wouldn’t give her a second glance, they were probably too beat down by what the empire was doing to pay attention to a lone seraphim. Besides, they had forgotten how to properly treat them. If they hadn’t, then maybe they wouldn’t have just let the seraphim be stolen the way that they had.

She tightened her grip on the umbrella. It was the humans’ wars that brought malevolence and the need to steal seraphim for their power. So it was the humans’ fault that she was left on her own. It was the humans’ fault that her brother was gone.

Edna ducked her head, picking up her pace. She could waste the energy walking off her anger, cycling through it so it didn’t become malevolence. She might not have cared about much else, but becoming a hellion was _not_ something she was about to do.

She focused on the thud of her feet one the road and the echoes of those footsteps that she felt through the ground until something else caught her attention.

Edna jerked her head up, reaching back with one hand to clutch at the stuffed toy. It wasn’t the same pulse of power as the toy, it was something more familiar, slightly more like she was used to. It felt like a seraph.

She slowed her walk, rocking up onto her tiptoes to try and peer over the rise she was at the bottom of.

It took a moment for them to crest the rise, Edna’s eyes widening as she saw a seraphim walking openly with a human. Her gaze jumped down to the ridiculously ornate sword that the human was wearing and then back to the seraphim.

She had never heard of a seraphim being allowed to walk outside the bounds of their weapon. Besides, weapons for binding seraphim had to be practical, because they were used in war. Edna doubted that the weapon that the human carried could stand up to combat, it looked too ornamental. But that explained nothing about what they were doing together. She had always assumed that seraphim would stay away from humans as a rule now, unless they knew them especially, like Eizen had known the ones from the Van Eltia Shipping Company.

Edna tilted her head to the side, taking a step back towards the woods. She was still making her decision when the seraph saw her. Edna lifted her umbrella slightly, freezing in surprise when the seraph practically ran down the rise towards her.

The seraph stopped a short distance away from her, looking up and down the road before folding her hands in front of her. “This is unexpected, but I wouldn’t head that way. There are soldiers on the road.”

“The empire’s?” The seraph’s solemn nod was all she needed. Edna tightened her hold on her umbrella.

The ports were still far away, and she didn’t know how far the enemy was spread between her and them. On top of that, she was tired of walking, tired of the malevolence.

Edna shook her head, trying to get herself to focus. “Is there another way I can get to the ports?”

“The ports?” The human spoke up, Edna watching him warily. He looked as exhausted as she felt and she expected him to collapse face first at any moment. Humans had always been strangely fragile creatures for all they could do. She glanced over his heavily stained black and white cloak before she looked back up at his face, watching him as he spoke. “You’d have to go past Ladylake and they’ve had that area locked down completely for months now. The ports are some of the most heavily guarded areas of Hyland. Why would you want to go there?”

“I promised my brother.”

The words came out with more force than she intended, but they seemed to work just as well. The human blanched and looked away while the seraph took a step forward towards her.

Edna watched as the seraph smoothed out her dress before dropping into a crouch. “We might be able to find a way, if that’s still what you want. But we have to check in with a few others first. If that’s alright with you.” When Edna didn’t respond immediately, she looked around. “Where is your brother?”

“The empire has him.”

Edna started at the flare of heat and the smell of sulfur that bubbled up around the seraph for a moment, even more startled that she didn’t see any flames from the sudden flare up. Even more surprising was the fact that the human didn’t react. He took it in stride like he was used to the world changing around seraphim. And maybe he was.

She tapped her umbrella against her shoulder one more time before turning it and planting the tip of it in the ground. “I was going to go to a port and try and find somewhere safe for seraphim, but there aren’t any, are there?”

The human was the one to shake his head. “Not that I know of.”

Edna studied the two of them for a moment before she turned her attention back to the seraph. “And where are you two going?”

“We’re meeting up with people from Hyland, to see if they need our help. We can’t offer much, but we can start to clear out the hellions.”

“Why bother?”

“Good question.”

“Michael!”

The man shrugged, dropping one hand to rest on his sword. “It was.” He shook his head, focusing on her again. “We’re doing it because it’s our job to keep the peace between humans and seraphim and to help purify the malevolence.”

“Which is why we’re going to talk to these people. We might be able to help them as much as they can help us.”

Edna considered them for a moment before turning to the human. She pressed the tip of her umbrella harder against the ground, watching the stuff toy out of the corner of her eye. It hadn’t reacted to anything, its energy a steady pulse. That didn’t tell her if these two were a threat, but it was as good as a promise of support. Besides, she had never heard of a seraphim who would side for humans over another seraphim and the fire seraph seemed nice if overenthusiastic.

She sighed, gripping the handle of her umbrella tightly. “What do you plan to do, if you’re successful?”

“Free the seraphim.” The response was immediate, Edna seeing Michael’s jaw tighten for a moment. “It’s my duty as Shepherd.”

Edna raised an eyebrow, but didn’t say anything. She’d heard stories of Shepherds, from Eizen and other seraphim. But they had all talked about the Shepherds as if they were something dead and gone. She’d never expected to run into one, or a human calling himself one.

She glanced back over at the fire seraph, watching her carefully. Certainly the seraph would react if any of what Michael said wasn’t true.

The seraph didn’t say anything. She just stood up and smiled at her. Edna nodded back, unsure of what else to do. She wasn’t about to get cozy with the two when they had just met, especially when she wasn’t sure if she could trust the human. He might not be as bad as the ones from the empire, but she was still wary. But, as far as she could tell, there was no point in getting to the ports when she wouldn’t be able to get through without someone from the empire trying to catch her and she couldn’t just sail off and leave Eizen. That wouldn’t be right. As far as she could see, the seraph and Michael were her best options.

Edna took a deep breath, giving the two of them a long look. Then, she nodded, lifting her umbrella back to her shoulder. “I’ll help, if it means getting my brother back.”

“We can try.” Michael sighed. “But no promises.”

Lailah flapped one of her hands at him, Edna not sure if that mean that Michael should elaborate or shut up, and she didn’t care. The two of them obviously had their own way of doing things and she didn’t intend to interfere.

She turned on her heel so she was facing the direction that the two of them had been heading, squinting back at the way she had come. Edna rolled her shoulders, daring a look back over them when neither of the other two commented on what she was doing. “So, where are we headed?”

“To the Hyland military camp.” Michael stepped around her and started walking down the road. The fire seraph was a step behind him, obviously lagging to give Edna a chance to walk beside her.

Edna took the offer, falling into step beside the fire seraph. She watched the back of Michael’s black and white cape with every step he took, tracing out the patterns to make some kind of sense in them before shaking her head. “What’s at the military camp?”

“People who might help us. And a few friends of ours.”

“And you trust them?”

It seemed to take the seraph a moment to understand what she meant, but Edna could tell the exact moment she did. The air around them flared up with heat again before it abruptly cooled back down. “I do. They’ve never tried to hurt us. In fact, some of them helped save me.”

Edna scoffed, surprised when the seraph just laughed in response. “It’s true. They helped Michael smuggle me out of Ladylake when it was under attack.”

Edna glanced between Michael and the seraph before shrugging. “If you say so.”

“It’s alright. You can form your own opinion of them.”

“Why should I? I’m just tagging along until we can help my brother.”

“That might take a while.”

“I’m patient.”

The fire seraph sighed, but didn’t say anything else. Edna was almost glad, she had enough to think over, like the fact that a group of humans hadn’t immediately jumped to bind a seraph to a weapon. That was a kind of nobility that was only heard about in stories. Then again, she was traveling with a Shepherd, which was only heard about in stories too. Maybe she had stumbled into some strange fairytale. Then again, that was certainly better than spending the rest of her days in a nightmare of running away.

Besides, the seraph was nice, if talkative. And the Shepherd looked like he could be interesting.

Edna hummed to herself, tipping her head up to look at the sky as she sensed forward again. She hadn’t come all this way to get caught, and she wasn’t about to get her two allies caught either, not when they were her only chance of getting Eizen back.

END


End file.
